Friday, July 31, 2009

Vinod Khosla On Why Clean Technology Is Misunderstood

From the WSJ's Venture Capital Dispatch:

Vinod Khosla emphasized several times Thursday that costs – and not idealogy - will drive the clean technology industry, and said that much of the hype around cleantech is fueled by misunderstood information.

Khosla, a legendary venture capitalist and one of the most active investors in cleantech through his firm Khosla Ventures, said some of the books that have helped generate buzz were “probably written by English majors who could not get a real job,” he said onstage at the AlwaysOn Summit at Stanford University.

The industry is far more scientifically dense and difficult to predict than many seem to believe, he said, so almost everything being about cleantech today should be taken with a grain of salt.

“My favorite is Sheryl Crow saying to use one square of toilet paper instead of two,” he said. “We hear a ton of this stuff … and it won’t make a dent.”

The cleantech industry is being portrayed as the wave of the future, he said, and perhaps the basis of a lucrative new manufacturing industry in America. And while this could be true, it will be a much longer – and harder – road to get there than many believe, Khosla said....MORE